Chaos Corona Forum

Chaos Corona for 3ds Max => [Max] General Discussion => Topic started by: Alex Abarca on 2014-02-20, 06:26:25

Title: Whats the Best way to Scatter?
Post by: Alex Abarca on 2014-02-20, 06:26:25
I havent used scatter. And I have some questions on best pratices. In the image I have several sizes of grass clumps, the largest being 24" inches diameter and the smallest about 6" inches.

1. Which is the best size for scatter?
2. Do I need to proxy the mesh?
3. What do you guys do when the scatter goes outside the predetermined plane, how do you chop and slice this?
Title: Re: Whats the Best way to Scatter?
Post by: Alex Abarca on 2014-02-20, 07:25:12
What do guys handle this? how do you make clean cuts with scatter?
Title: Re: Whats the Best way to Scatter?
Post by: peterguthrie on 2014-02-20, 08:57:53
forest pro can do this by keeping the grass models as much smaller objects but grouping the whole clump. It will then use the clump normally but use individual objects closer to the edge.

Mind you, if keymaster can think of a way of clipping the edge without needing to do this he'd be on to a winner ;)

(although short term stay focused on corona essential features!)
Title: Re: Whats the Best way to Scatter?
Post by: Utroll on 2014-02-20, 12:22:16
Very simple but true statement !!
Having to seed smaller instances around edges is sometimes a repetitive boring task, a element/object clipper would be really amazing.
Title: Re: Whats the Best way to Scatter?
Post by: jjduncs on 2014-02-22, 09:25:25
forest pro can do this by keeping the grass models as much smaller objects but grouping the whole clump. It will then use the clump normally but use individual objects closer to the edge.

Mind you, if keymaster can think of a way of clipping the edge without needing to do this he'd be on to a winner ;)

(although short term stay focused on corona essential features!)

Peter, do you mean instead of creating a few clumps with forest and converting them to meshes or edit polys (with each blade within as a element) then scattering them, you would do the same but detach all the grass blades from each other then group them again into clumps? Does this mean forest will use the clump group normally but then use the individual blades within the group at the edges? Sorry if thats way off but thats how i read it. If correct, it sounds interesting!
Title: Re: Whats the Best way to Scatter?
Post by: johan belmans on 2014-02-22, 09:34:53
have a look at this
http://www.itoosoft.com/tutorials/tutorial_grass_edges.php (http://www.itoosoft.com/tutorials/tutorial_grass_edges.php)

cheers

belly
Title: Re: Whats the Best way to Scatter?
Post by: Alex Abarca on 2014-02-22, 21:52:06
Thanks that forest pack is serious business. However I cant afford it right now.

I used the smaller clump as illustrated above. It seems to work OK. not perfect but just Ok. Here are some renders. i guess for those of us that dont have forest pack, stick with smaller clumps of grass.
Title: Re: Whats the Best way to Scatter?
Post by: jjduncs on 2014-02-23, 06:11:28
Thanks Belly, that pretty much summed up what i was wondering.


Alex, how is your grass material set up? Looks great!
Title: Re: Whats the Best way to Scatter?
Post by: Alex Abarca on 2014-02-23, 07:54:49
Alex, how is your grass material set up? Looks great!
[/quote]

Thank you. This is what I did...Note I don't have a good grass model, nor the best maps. Any one have a good grass clump they can share?

Title: Re: Whats the Best way to Scatter?
Post by: jjduncs on 2014-02-23, 09:27:19
Sweet, thanks.
I tried a similar mat but the frontbackmat didnt work too well for me. I think its because my front and back bitmaps were too different so it looked weird.

PS. sorry this is in the wrong thread.
Title: Re: Whats the Best way to Scatter?
Post by: Dervish on 2014-02-23, 18:07:39
You could use forest pack light.  Good for small areas.

Off topic but VrayPattern cuts or gives sharp edges. See Xoio guys for that. http://xoio-air.de/2013/product-feature-vray-pattern-tutorial-and-production-insight/
Title: Re: Whats the Best way to Scatter?
Post by: Alex Abarca on 2014-02-23, 19:55:38
Sweet, thanks.
I tried a similar mat but the frontbackmat didnt work too well for me. I think its because my front and back bitmaps were too different so it looked weird.

PS. sorry this is in the wrong thread.

Sometimes I do it like what shown in your mat editor, and it works fine. I also see it didn't increase rendertime too much. Also, you have six shades of color variance. Anyhow it looks good. Refraction is what kills your render time, stay away from that.
Title: Re: Whats the Best way to Scatter?
Post by: Caue Rodrigues on 2014-04-11, 18:48:30
Hi guys, this is my grass test.
I took a base that already had, and added the front / back materials.
I would like the opinion of you, what did you think?
Title: Re: Whats the Best way to Scatter?
Post by: Alex Abarca on 2014-04-11, 20:13:33
I think its good, I like the variation of grass blades that you have going on. The edges look clean and the sporadic spiky grass blade just makes it read better.